Chargers move to a city where no one wants them

Sam Campisano, Sports Editor

After 56 years in San Diego, owner Dean Spanos has loaded up the trucks and moved his Chargers franchise up the freeway to Los Angeles.

It was an anticipated move, but one that nonetheless left Chargers fans in San Diego devastated. Fans who had supported the team for decades all of the sudden had the franchise ripped away from them because San Diego voters rejected a ridiculous proposal to build a new stadium that would have costed over $1 billion.

Ostensibly, Commissioner Goodell claimed that Dean Spanos worked “diligently” to try and work out a stadium solution in San Diego. Unfortunately, the greed of the league ruined 56 years of history.

The Chargers will pay an estimated $600 million in relocation fees for the rights to be the second NFL team in Los Angeles. Between the $600 million relocation fee and the $300 million loan from the league, the Chargers had $900 million in available stadium funds, more than enough to build an adequate stadium.

Instead, the Chargers demanded hundreds of millions in public dollars to build a $1.1 billion stadium. When the voters turned them down, they fled to Los Angeles. The Chargers were met with a much different reaction than the Rams were when they moved to Los Angeles last year. The Chargers were publicly criticized in local media outlets, chastised on social media for both the move and their short-lived new logo, and booed loudly at a Lakers-Clippers basketball game.

Angelinos have shown that they have no interest in supporting a second NFL team. Dean Spanos, however, will profit off of his team being located in the country’s second largest market. In the NFL, that’s more important than 56 years of history.